To Truly Be Yours
by TheGirlWithTheCoat
Summary: Human AU: Bella's husband, James, has found a way to legally punish criminal offenders by selling them into slavery. When Bella is at one of the auctions, she decides to buy Edward Cullen, in order to exract her revenge against him for killing her family.


**AN: Finally, a Twilight fic that I feel I can publish! Please, as a young girl aspiring to be the best writer she can be, leave some constructive criticism! I need to be told where I can improve, so if you guys could go ahead and leave some that would be awesome.**

**Note: This is set in a world astoundingly different from ours. This is so AU from the Twilight world and it's also really AU from, well, our world!**

Bella Forestter looked beautiful tonight. Of course that was true of most of the time these days, but she'd put particular effort into tonight. Since getting married to James she put more thought into her looks each day than she had in a whole year before their marriage. She was wearing a black velvet dress, with her glossy brown hair pulled into an elegant bun that looked terribly complicated and one of her best smiles. James was waiting at the bottom of the stairs, wearing an expensive tux, with his hair carefully styled to look as though he hadn't really bothered with it at all, although Bella knew he'd probably spent hours in front of the mirror perfecting course they both had to look their best for tonight.

He grinned when he saw her and Bella tried not to wince. Something about that toothy smile unnerved her. Oh she loved James, she truly did. She'd been head over heels since they'd met in college but sometimes... he frightened her. She knew it was silly. He'd never done thing to hurt her, never laid a hand on her. But still there was this voice in the back of her mind (that sounded an awful lot like Alice) that told her if he was really as heartless enough to do what he did for a living... that she had to run. Fast. Before it was too late. It was a good thing Bella had an endless stream of excuses for what James did. Oh, he's just doing what's right. He's making the world a lot safer this way. He's putting those criminals to decent use. It was also a good thing that Bella had grown skilled at removing worry and doubt from her mind over the years. It was a necessary skill when living with James.

"Look at you." He offered her his arm as she reached the foot of the stairs. "You'll be the Bella of the ball."

She couldn't help but laugh a true, genuine laugh. Not because it was funny but because that was such a James thing too say. Goofy, sweet and affectionate, like when they were young together. But it was hardly a ball they were attending. No. It was the auctions. God, how she hated these damn things. Hours of being paraded around on James' arm like a showdog, fake-laughing at stupid jokes she didn't get and being treated like some sort of pet. But of course, she had to attend. She was Ms Forestter, wife of James Forestter, the man who'd started up the slavery movement in the first place. She shuddered as her mental voice said that word. Slavery. That's what it was, really. They could paint it in any light they wanted, labeled it with whatever fancy name they chose, it was still slavery.

Oh, she was proud, of James, of course she was. Back when she'd first met him, he'd barely had two cents to rub together. He'd been sweeping the floor at a local bar Alice once dragged Bella too and, well that had been it. Love at first sight, James called it, to which Bella would always reply: "Yhea, you knocking me over with the broomstick!"

She'd been supporting him since the night she meet him. Of course, her only family back then was Alice, so that just meant borrowing of off her a lot. It made Bella feel awful but Alice really didn't mind. She came from a wealthy family and she was one of the most generous souls Bella had ever met. She could've easily bought her way into Harvard is she liked, but she choose to attend a small town's local college instead. Alice claimed to like the simpler things in life, but Bella wouldn't put it past her too buy every single on of her friends a string of polo ponies.

But then James had an idea. He'd mentioned it to Bella briefly, telling her something along the lines of putting criminals in prison to good use in society but mostly kept to himself about it. Alice, with her contacts, got him in touch with a big, powerful firm, not really pestering James to tell her it as much as could've because she wanted to be as supportive as possible. The company was very interested in James' idea and while they were working the knots out of it, James came right out and said what his plan was. When he did, Alice paled considerably and from the look on her face, she regretted helping him in the first place. From that moment on, Alice saw James in a who different light.

His idea? To take big time criminal offenders out of prison and put them to better use. James had said that they really hadn't being paying their debt to society just locked away, doing nothing, so they should be taken out and... what a perfect way to gain free labor. People who have committed the biggest crimes, murder, rape, to be put through a training process and sold into slavery. Not only that, but this would most likely scare other people out of committing crimes too. Perfect deal.

Alice had urged Bella to leave him. Said for him to even consider something like this was disgusting and vile and made James nothing more than a heartless monster. Then, Bella slapped her friend, called her a bitch and told her to get out of her life. And the hadn't spoken since. Bella simply kept convincing herself that was James was doing was a good thing and that she hated Alice. She hated Alice for cursing the man she loved, for trying to control Bella's life, for not being open enough to James' idea out. She hated Alice for being right.

James' plan went ahead. Shockingly enough, the public approved big time, You did have a small group of rebels, but mostly people just went ahead and accepted it. Then, they embraced it and Bella couldn't for the life of her understand why so many people were okay with it. She was duty bound but they weren't so why was this considered to be the norm by most people.

But she had no time to wonder why, for tonight, she had a husband to support, so she bravely took James' arm and went with him dutifully.

"Go mingle, honey." James said, almost immediately breaking off from Bella's arm when they entered the hall. "I'm gonna have a look around." At the females, of course. They owned a great deal of slaves back home, almost all of them female, young and attractive. James sure knew how to pick 'em. Especially that Victoria. God, Bella hated that Victoria.

Mostly board, Bella wandered around the hall, checking her watch every three seconds to see when the auction would start. God, thirty more minutes?

Bella tried very hard not to look at the slaves. They were all around the ends of the room, on their knees and heads bent for people to look at. Sometimes, it made Bella physically ill to look, so she mostly just chose not to. She felt an overwhelming wave of guilt by just being here. But there was one man... he was hard not to notice. He was wearing a ragged pair of worn out jeans and, well that was it really. He had bronze-ish hair and was really pale. He was good looking and... oddly familiar. She couldn't see his face but she was sure she knew this man...

And then it it her.

Edward _fucking _Cullen.

Oh, of course she remembered him. She could remember him from the trial, from her nightmares. How he, unashamed pleaded guilty to the heartlessly murdering her family, how he'd broken free from the muscle and tried to come up to her to apologize before he was dragged away. Of course she remembered. She'd spat on him. Literately. And now she was glaring down at him, practically shaking in disgust, some of the nearby guards giving her odd looks.

And, for the first time in three years, Bella finally understood why the masses had been so accepting of this. She fully understood.

"Bella, honey?" It was James. "C'mon, bidding time."

Bella had never bought a slave. She'd been attending these things for the past three years and she never once did. Well, that would change tonight.


End file.
